Ghost
by death-in-the-orchard
Summary: Abraham van Hellsing's era (and Arthur Hellsing's) - Alucard in his old master's study as Van Hellsing's time comes to an end.
1. Chapter 1

Note: Posted for/because of Schinguire.

* * *

The Vampire Alucard stood on the Indian rug in the midst of a collection of different colored arm chairs. The colors of the cushioned arm chairs suited the study, repeated elsewhere among the books that lined the walls, the wood paneling, the rug, and in other components of the room.

The vampire stepped slowly around a low coffee table that was laden with books and a few of Abraham's trinkets. These trinkets could be found among the shelves, on the mantle, or at the desk. The creature looked for these various trinkets now, doing so quietly, no longer pacing.

It was as though the room was frozen, in some way set apart so that time would not drag it callously over the mixture of gravel and razor-edged shards that made up this reality. The vampire attended to the perfect silence, and stillness; the precision of the contents of the room, their precise arrangement, colors, and scents.

Van Hellsing's corpse was growing cold upstairs in his bed, but the room still smelled of him, and carried remnants of his presence. A presence that was quickly disappearing, like sand carried into a desert. A forlorn and dark desert, empty of life.

This moment would not last. It would be swept away, just as the things in this study would be swept away, rearranged, discarded, in some way changed. It would change, as it must. Yes. Nothing could prevent that.

No. The vampire stared.

There was a small clock on the mantle, and the creature heard it. It ticked, ticked steadily, and the room remained as it was. But the ghost was fading. The room was hollowing, dying without the man who had sustained it; he who had built it, selected the chairs and the books and the rug, who had arranged his stupid trinkets and purposeless playthings all about, as though they would be retrieved or looked at again soon.

And here was the vampire, not quite a trinket, but yet another remnant of the man, another mark on the ever advancing present. The vampire was a belonging, left behind. A thing, now, to be laid in strange hands, to be turned about in strange hands, picked and prodded at by strange hands; to be used or discarded, ultimately changed - by strange hands.

One by one, the trinkets disappeared from the room as the clock ticked without fail. Soon, the vampire too was gone.


	2. Chapter 2

Time was moving on at a fine pace, yes. Alucard had awakened with the rise of the moon and come into the study, to find it lit and occupied.

Cigar smoke hung in the air like an opaque impurity, like the fault that clouds the translucent body of a cut gem; the strong smell seared through Abraham's weakened and fading scents. He was gone from this room. Gone, entirely.

Arthur Hellsing had cluttered the study with books and bottles, newspapers, journals, letters, and bills. Women too, he had brought into Abraham's old domain, though the dirt over Abraham's grave was still bare soil. Weeds and grass had yet to take root. The man in the sarcophagus was still in the early stages of decay, as he must be.

The Vampire Alucard's expression changed as this image invaded his mind, ancient memories of the faces of sunken, discolored, and blackening corpses lending themselves to his dark musings. Musings he hated, but could not fend off.

Arthur Hellsing sat behind Abraham's old desk, smoking liberally, and with his foot on an ottoman. His hand reached out for a glass of liquor. Arthur did not need to look up from the volume he read. His hand knew what to do. He drank, and the hand returned the glass to the desk. There wasn't a coaster to be found, anywhere, amongst the clutter.

The vampire grew restless with waiting, frustrated with being so treated. Arthur had not established himself as master, or given the creature any reason to stand for the recurring offenses that were carelessly flung in his path.

Hatred. …No, it was not hatred he felt. The feelings had not ripened enough, there was not yet reason enough to hate, as a creature like Alucard was capable of hating. He did not respect Arthur, though he knew that Arthur was not incompetent, dull, stupid, or otherwise unsuitable for his station. But he was not Abraham. And he never would be Abraham.

Abraham was rotting. _Rotting_. And his things were gone. His scent could be found only in the depths of furniture cushions, or else trapped in the pages of books that had gone unmolested. There the scent might be preserved, to be detected only by the vampire's senses. But should he open these books, like capsules, or like miniature sarcophagi, their valuable contents - the scent - would be lost.

Alucard continued to wait, his expression narrowing. Arthur noticed, and left off reading to stare at the monster he had been given. A monster of incomprehensible power, was his to possess.

The concept of any man wielding such a weapon disgusted Arthur: a weapon of evil, devoid of man's own power and ingenuity. Man prevailed without making deals with the Devil. That was what 'Hellsing' meant to this young leader.

Arthur pushed the drink away and slapped down his volume, leaving it there on the desk. A smear of water would stain the back cover, but Arthur had not noticed the water, and if he had, he wouldn't have cared.

Arthur assessed the vampire coolly, and his finger tapped with his inner ponderings as he conversed with himself.

The monster was staring at him, and not in an especially flattering way. Inwardly, Arthur smiled, so that outwardly the muscles in his face twitched, but he would never permit the expression to manifest before the creature.

 _He does not approve of me._ Arthur blinked, and unconsciously he sighed. _He is used to having the great Van Hellsing to call master. And now he is left with the unknown, though moderately accomplished, Arthur Hellsing._

 _Who would have thought that a creature like this had opinions or feelings that could be interpreted by a human being?_ This oddly amused and interested Arthur, and he held his mouth to check that nothing had shown on his face, and to ensure nothing would. _What a beast._ He thought, suddenly, looking at the height and proportions of the tamed vampire king. _Look at him! And four centuries in the making. He must look at all of us as imbecile children. Only the great, only the geniuses of our kind, might connect with his intellect._

 _Well._

The tone of Arthur's thoughts shifted, and his eyelids fell a degree.

 _Whatever sane intellect that dead skull might house, untainted by the madness he amassed through his wretched and bloody life, and the madness of the damned and monstrous who slaughter and devour without thought or feeling, without a capacity for sympathy while they might understand, so keenly, the agony the victim is enduring. And the madness of time, so much time, passing - so many things experienced, persons and things lost, a mind overfilled with five or six lifetimes of regret, disillusionment, suffering…_

 _Mad insanity, without clarity - there is no use for such a mind. Such a mind is as good as ash. No, in fact it is worth less, since ash at least can lend some fertility. There is still hope for recovery, in ash._

 _The monster is not to be relied upon. No. God's work is not to be accomplished by dead hands, only by those which he has granted life - continued, mortal life._ This thought was reached, and it sunk down into the heart of the man's musings, as though it intended to become the core of his beliefs surrounding the vampire.


End file.
